


Feeding Time

by Tevlyn_Tauly



Series: Herpetology [4]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Details of reptile feeding, Gen, Headcanon, REPTILES, Rescue, herpetology, venomous snakes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-08
Updated: 2019-02-08
Packaged: 2019-10-24 13:02:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17704763
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tevlyn_Tauly/pseuds/Tevlyn_Tauly
Summary: Time to feed the scaly babies!And to learn something new.





	Feeding Time

Today was dinner day.

Prompto had stayed over at Noctis' place the night before, so when he insisted on going home to feed his pets, the Prince and entourage had escorted him.

Unlocking the front door, he let Gladio, Ignis, and Noctis in ahead of him and shut the door behind him before he dumped his overnight bag and his keys onto the small table by the sofa.

"What do you have to do to get their food ready?" Noctis asked eager to help.

Prompto smiled and headed out back, where there was a huge boxed in box freezer. He took out two large boxes and carried them inside to the kitchen, setting them on the counter. "I need to heat these up and thaw them."

He opened the boxes and pulled out three frozen rabbits, setting them aside on a chopping board, then pulled another one over and started to unload the rats. After the rats were the mice, and then finally the pinkies, baby mice and rats for the smallest. Noctis Jr. was so small he would only get a few tails from them as he could not get anything bigger in yet.

"You feed them like this? As in, no skinning or anything?" Gladio asked, green around the gills.

"They prefer to eat them as they are, though sometimes I can skin them."

The empty boxes were chucked aside and Prompto pulled out a heat gun and started heating up the rabbit first. He was careful, not putting the heat too high and keeping the heat gun a good distance so he did not burn the fur or cook the outside while trying to thaw it.

"So Perdita gets one of the rabbits, who gets the rest?" Noctis asked.

"I have another big one, a male at 17 ft. He's a little meaner so I don't get him out as much around company."

"Is he the same type?" Ignis asked, curious.

"Yeah, he's a retic python, Titanium morph," Prompto said proudly.

"What are these morphs?" Gladio asked. He may have hated snakes but seemed to at least enjoy Prompto's enthusiasm.

"Oh, it's about their looks and genetics. It’s a really complicated system, so I'll write it up for you sometime," Prompto promised. He set aside one rabbit, now nearly warmed through, and starting on the next o the first could finish warming to room temperature.

"Can I help?" Noctis asked. "I really want to see how they eat."

"Sure. Uh, you mind cutting up some of the fruit on the side, like the berries and bananas? Some of the lizards like fruit as a treat." Prompto got a bowl down and found another chopping board.

Ignis came to join them, looking over at what both younger men were doing, advising Noctis on how to best cut up the fruit and not get hurt. It was nice. Quiet. A moment of reflection to take in all the new things being learned about Prompto.

The blond found a meat thermometer and used it to check each of the pieces he had thawed, running the heat gun over the ones that were just a little too cool for his liking.

"You going to give them cream with these strawberries?" Noctis joked, cleaning up his hands now he was finished.

"I wouldn't put it past Impala to try and drink the cream too," Prompto laughed. He grabbed one of the boxes and piled the meat into it, carrying it with him as he guided the way to the back room. "Today's a good day to introduce you to the other part of my collection. They're dangerous but I'm not getting any of them out so it's fine."

"You have more?" Gladio asked, stopping at the door to the reptile room.

"Oh yeah. I've been rescuing and being given these for years."

He moved to Perdita's vivarium first and unlocked it, the box placed on the table in the room. Standing, he grabbed one of the rabbits and reached down to wave it in her face carefully. "Come on, Perdy. Dinner time, sweetie."

Noctis watched, stumbling back as Perdita struck at the rabbit and immediately wrapped around it, squeezing the already dead creature. Prompto seemed unalarmed and gently managed to press Perdita and her meal back into the vivarium and locking it up.

"What was she doing?" Noctis asked, almost horrified even as he crouched to watch as the large snake opened her mouth and started to pull herself over her food and swallowing it.

"Constricting. Pythons are constrictor’s, so when they hunt they wrap themselves around their prey and slowly crush it and suffocate it to death. Then they open their mouths wide, find the head, and chomp down. They have teeth at the back, right, and they hook them in and sort of use those to pull the rabbit into their mouth until it's all the way down," Prompto answered as he went to the racks and started to feed each of the smaller snakes with rats or the tiny baby mice. He also had a set of worms and mice tails that he had cut up and held the little tray out towards Noctis. "Here, you can feed Junior and the other babies. They get one worm each first and then go through with the little tail pieces to see if any of them are still hungry. Don't use your fingers, always the tongs hanging next to the baby's rack."

"Gotcha." Noctis grabbed the tray, and then the tongs, before pulling out the first little drawer and wriggled a piece of worm in front of a little white and yellow baby. He laughed as it struck and took the piece to eat down, and worked one by one. Noctis Jr. seemed especially eager to eat and had barely let him have time to hold the food out before he was striking. "You're just too cute, junior. There we go, don't go too fast."

After feeding the smaller snakes, and setting fruit into the Tegu's enclosure, as well as giving the rats to some of the meat-eating lizards, Prompto led them to another door hidden between racks. It led to stairs going into the basement and he headed down, humming to himself as he pulled a cord at the bottom that turned the lights on. There were more racks and vivariums and a table in the middle again. He set the box of the remaining food onto it and looked into the nearest enclosure.

"What's in here?" Gladio asked from the stairs, braving everything to protect Noctis.

"These are my venomous snakes. I only have a few of them, and they're not really handled, but as long as you take into account their body language you can do so without getting bit." Prompto grinned as one of them slithered up to the glass.

"Why do you have venomous snakes?!" Noctis could understand the ones upstairs, but the dangerous ones?

"I don't keep these ones for long," Prompto explained. "They've all been caught in people's homes, and I take care of them, make sure they're fed and healthy, milk their venom for the hospital to make anti-venom, then they're let go outside the wall."

"So you house them to help save people's lives?" Ignis asked.

"And theirs, but yeah. These ones have only been here a few weeks; they'll get taken out to one of the desert areas nearby in a couple more weeks."

As Prompto got the tongs and some food for the few snakes and unlocked each enclosure one at a time to feed them, Ignis realised there was so much more to their friend than they had ever expected.


End file.
